CMS to Encourage a Safer U.S. Healthcare System

The U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Service (CMS, Baltimore, MD, USA) is launching a second nationwide effort to reduce patient harm and decrease hospital readmissions.

The CMS Hospital Innovation and Improvement Network will award USD 347 million to 16 different groups, including hospital associations, quality improvement organizations, and health systems, with the goal of achieving a 20% decrease in overall patient harm and a 12% reduction in 30-day hospital readmissions by 2019, based on a 2014 baseline. The new project follows the success of the Partnership for Patients initiative launched in 2010, which set a goal of 40% reduction in preventable harm, with a 17% reduction in all-cause harm.

The hospitals in the network will be required to work on reducing both readmissions and a range of hospital-acquired conditions, including adverse drug events involving anticoagulants, opioids, and hypoglycemic agents; central line-associated blood stream infections; catheter-associated urinary tract infection (CAUTI); Clostridium difficile infection; injury from falls and immobility; pressure ulcers; sepsis and septic shock; surgical site infections (SSIs); venous thromboembolism (VT); and ventilator-associated events.

“We have made significant progress in keeping patients safe; an estimated 2.1 million fewer patients harmed, 87,000 lives saved, and nearly USD 20 billion in cost-savings from 2010 to 2014, and we are focused on accelerating improvement efforts,” said Patrick Conway, MD, MSc, acting principal deputy administrator and chief medical officer of the CMS. “The work of the Hospital Improvement and Innovation Networks will allow us to continue to improve health care safety across the nation and reduce readmissions at a national scale, keeping people as safe and healthy as possible.”

“In just four years, the Partnership for Patients made an important difference. The fact that we have done this in collaboration with patients and families as genuine partners, from the point of conception to design and development and implementation of this work, has been a key ingredient in its success,” said Debra Ness, president of the National Partnership for Women and Families (Washington, DC, USA). “We will do our best to educate patients and family members to help them be full contributors in this process.”

Related Links:
U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Service
National Partnership for Women and Families